National spotlight shines on FlipSide

The National Young Readers Conference, a gathering of Newspapers in Education professionals and youth journalism editors, was held in St. Louis on July 22-26. During the conference, the Youth Editorial Alliance held its annual awards program, which honors student journalists for their contributions to local youth and teen sections as well as recognizing outstanding youth journalism programs.

FlipSide snagged several honors this year, including first place for Best Web Site, which we also won last year. The FlipSide site (www.wvflipside.com) was designed by Alex Morgado, and is maintained by Greg Wood under the supervision of Amy Robinson. If you haven’t checked it out, be sure to stop by. We hope to make some new and exciting changes in the coming months to make it even better!

In addition, the monthly FlipSide magazine, which is distributed to area high schools during the school year, earned honorable mention in Best Tabloid Design. (Not bad considering editor Robinson just learned the design program a year ago!) We received another honorable mention in the Special Project category for our Sept. 24, 2005, Hurricane Katrina-themed FlipSide Saturday page, which featured stories by Emily Barksdale, Paige Lavender, Robert L. Gabriel, Jared Bennett and Robinson.

Finally, FlipSide writer Andrew Smith was awarded third place in the review category for his evaluation of the 2005 summer blockbuster “Batman Begins.” Smith is a 2006 graduate of Winfield High School.